676 
opium  Alkaloids. 
(Am.  Jour.  Pharm. 
\   September,  1920. 
THE  CANADIAN  AND  BRITISH  LAWS  RELATING  TO 
CHEMICAL  PATENTS* 
By  a.  E.  MacRae. 
In  the  present  Canadian  Act  there  is  no  restriction  on  the  nature 
of  the  composition  of  matter  which  may  be  patented,  except  that  it 
must  be  new  and  useful  and  the  result  of  invention.  The  same  condi- 
tions exist  in  the  United  States  and  did  exist  in  Great  Britain  until 
a  very  recent  date,  when  a  new  Patents  and  Designs  Bill,  which  was 
introduced  in  the  British  House  of  Commons,  in  November,  19 17, 
became  law.  This  Bill  passed  the  House  of  Commons  without 
debate,  discussion,  or  division,  and  by  it,  I  understand,  products  of 
chemical  processes  or  intended  for  food  or  for  medicinal  or  surgical 
purposes  may  not  be  claimed  in  a  patent  application  but  only  the 
process.  That  is,  specifications  relating  to  an  article  or  substance 
made  by  chemical  processes  or  intended  for  medicinal  or  surgical 
use  may  contain  claims  for  the  process  of  manufacture  only  and  not 
for  the  substance  or  composition  of  matter.  Some  other  countries 
also  refuse  patent  pretection  on  similar  compositions.  Germany, 
Austria,  Japan,  and  Russia  refuse  to  grant  patents  on  foods,  medi- 
cines, or  chemical  products,  and  in  Switzerland  neither  the  product 
nor  the  process  of  making  them  may  be  patented.  Sweden  will 
patent  processes  of  making  foods  or  medicines  but  not  the  product. 
Denmark  will  not  patent  medicines,  articles  of  food,  or  processes  of 
making  articles  of  food.  France,  Italy,  and  Spain  refuse  patents  on 
medicines  and  pharmaceutical  preparations  of  all  kinds. 
*  Journal  of  the  Society  of  Chemical  Industry,  Vol.  39,  May  31,  1920,  No. 
10,  p.  177;'. 
NEW  FACTS  REGARDING  OPIUM  ALKALOIDS.* 
In  a  series  of  investigations  on  the  pharmacology  of  opium 
alkaloids  Macht  emphasized  that  these  compounds  could  be  grouped 
into  two  distinct  categories;  in  doing  this  he^  defined  more  clearly 
the  work  of  Pal,  Straub,  Sahli,  and  others.  One  of  the  categories, 
the  piperidin-phenanthrene  group,  of  which  morphine  is  the  prin- 
cipal member,  includes  substances  that  stimulate  the  contractions 
*  From  Jour.  Amer.  Med.  Assoc.,  July  17,  1920. 
1  Macht,  D.  I.:  "Action  of  Opium  Alkaloids,"  J.  Pharmacol.  &  Exper. 
Therap.,  7:  339,  1915. 
